The monthly meeting of the Texas Transportation Commission, the five-member board that oversees TxDOT, was dominated by the agency’s plans to convert some paved roads to gravel and to transfer responsibility for maintenance of some popular thoroughfares to cities.

On the gravel plan, officials announced a 60-day moratorium on converting any more state roads to gravel so that TxDOT could get more input from the affected communities. The decision comes after ...

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Comments (12)

Where'd the money go? The price of gas keeps rising, so the taxes collected should be more than enough to cover the correct repairs. Isn't that what that what our gas taxes and the toll costs are supposed to pay for? People haven't quit driving. So where's the money?

Since it's the oil industry that has the trucks out that are ravaging those roadways, why doesn't the state make them pay fees to keep the roads in repair? Oh, I forgot. We can't ruffle the feathers of Big Bidness.

Texas gas tax has remained static at .20 per gallon since 1991. Inflation and increasing construction costs have depleted the buying power of the taxes that are collected. This crisis is one the legislature has kicked down the road for many, many years.TxDot is caught in the middle between a fast growing motoring public that demands more lanes and a legislature that will not fund them.

Thank you for your response but you never answered the question. What are you going to do about it.I'm glad you brought up all the lawsuits against the federal government, how about filing a few lawsuits here in the state of Texas to uphold our Constitution. The city of Austin Austin ISD and Hutto ISD all recognize same-sex marriage and paying same-sex spouses my tax dollar.I am 59 years old have been a journalist for the last 30 years and covered many natural disasters. I lived through hurricane Betsy in the 60s and I never ever heard of the government turning down a declaration of disaster before all the lawsuits you file. The Bastrop and West Texas initially were all denied does this have anything to do with those lawsuits you filed against the federal government?But let's stay on target, what are you going to do.Thank you for your time.David P Ronda Griffin

seems like the problem with West was that it wasnt a natural disaster. it was man made. we did that to our selves. since we didnt collect information (since we are all for bidness), we end up with no idea whats around us and how dangerous it is or was. in West, the fertilizer plant hadnt really been inspected in a very long time. and they weren't exactly up todate. so when some thing went wrong (as they almost always do) it ended up wiping out their neighbors. guessing the Feds werent to thrilled about doing a lot more (that had already spent millions to help out) based on the fact that the problem would reoccur. and since we humans created the disaster we could avoid it. if we chose too. but we didnt. Feds did come around. probably felt sorry for us, since the state has no money to regulate or to fix the mess that happens because of the former. but just wait we will see much higher insurance bills as insurance companies raise the rates to handle the higher risk based on unknown man made disasters popping up every where. lack of regulation and info can kill (see West). and the gas tax is a flat rate per gallon. price has no impact. number of gallons does (and we are using less gas now than before). while we haven't exactly quit driving all together, we are definitely driving less. add on those large trucks used by oil and gas companies. in areas where there isnt money to support more maintenance of roads. and you end up with gravel roads. though as i recall the companies originally said they would handle this. but that was then. and its not what they will do now. so our state doesnt have the money to support the roads we have (imagine that. cut taxes and less money for roads or school. who would of thunk of that?0. so i am guessing we will have fewer and fewer paved roads. after a time we will have fewer jobs as most jobs in Texas are related to producing some thing. which requires shipping it else where.

It can take years for a paved road to actually become dangerous to drive on.

There are paved roads that are still far better to drive on than gravel paved over 50 years ago.

If heavy trucks are the problem, the notion that gravel is safer is a ludicrous lie.

Trucks have a harder time on gravel than they do on the crappiest paved road.

No matter what the situation was, the roads would have remained in decent shape at least for a few years as the lifespan of a paved road is a long time even when not maintained properly.

The notion that they had to rip out these roads is an obvious lie, and those responsible for it should be fired.

September 1, 2013 @ 6:14 p.m.

dave starkey

Why are we experiencing a lack of funding during an oil boom? This really is fascism in action. Texas has to look out for those poor old oil companies. Poor BP only cleared $24 billion, Exxon scraped by on $44 billion profit. Poor old Chevron had to move in the poor house at only $16 billion in profit. Maybe we could raise my grandmothers property taxes so the oil companies have a road to drive their trucks on!Keep voting republican and keep getting what your getting. Private companies collecting toll on Texas highways.